This article examines the changing nature of first-contact care in the United States and its shift from primary care practitioners to emergency physicians, specialists, and outpatient departments. This pattern is far different from urgent access to primary care in other industrialized countries....

This article examines the changing nature of first-contact care in the United States and its shift from primary care practitioners to emergency physicians, specialists, and outpatient departments. This pattern is far different from urgent access to primary care in other industrialized countries....